A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 01 eBook

[6] Perhaps some account of this Soliman might be
contained in the lost
pages: But the circumstance
of a Mahomedan judge or consul at Canfu is
a circumstance worthy of notice,
and shews that the Mahomedans had
carried on a regular and settled
trade with China for a considerable
time, and were in high estimation
in that country.—­Renaud.

[7] It is difficult at this distance of time to ascertain
the rout laid
down by this author, on account
of the changes of names. This mart of
Siraff is not to be met with
in any of our maps; but it is said by the
Arabian geographers to have
been in the gulf of Persia, about sixty
leagues from Shiraz; and that
on its decay, the trade was transferred
to Ormuz.—­Renaud.

[8] It is probable, or rather certain, that Canton
is here meant.—­E.

[9] Meaning the Parsees or Guebres, the fire-worshippers
of Persia.—­E.

[10] It is probable that this Balhara, or king of
the people with bored
ears, which plainly means
the Indians, was the Zamorin or Emperor of
Calicut; who, according to
the reports of the most ancient Portuguese
writers concerning India,
was acknowledged as a kind of emperor in the
Indies, six hundred years
before they discovered the route to India by
the Cape of Good Hope.—­Harris.

The original editor of this voyage in
English, Harris, is certainly mistaken in this
point. The Balhara was the sovereign of Southern
Seindetic India; of which dominion Guzerat was
the principal province.—­E.

[11] This is a very early notice of the construction
and use of clocks, or
machinery to indicate divisions
of time, by means of weights.—­E.

SECTION II.

Commentary upon the foregoing Account, by Abu Zeid
al Hasan of Siraff.

Having very carefully examined the book I was desired
to peruse, that I might confirm what the author relates
so far as he agrees with what I have learnt concerning
the affairs of navigation, the kingdoms on the coast,
and the state of the countries of which he treats,
and that I might add what I have elsewhere collected
concerning these matters: I find that this book
was composed in the year of the Hegira 237, and that
the accounts given by the author are conformable with
what I have heard from merchants who have sailed from
Irak or Persia, through these seas. I find
also all that the author has written to be agreeable
to truth, except some few passages, in which he has
been misinformed. Speaking of the custom, of the
Chinese in setting meat before their dead, and believing
that the dead had eaten, we had been told the same
thing, and once believed it; but have since learnt,
from a person of undoubted credit, that this notion
is entirely groundless, as well as that the idolaters
believe their idols speak to them. From that
creditable person we have likewise been informed, that
the affairs of China wear quite a different aspect
since those days: and since much has been related
to explain why our voyages to China have been interrupted,
and how the country has been ruined, many customs
abolished, and the empire divided, I shall here declare
what I know of that revolution.